medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Dear All,
An untimely glitch at JISCMail has delayed the production of today's (19. July) 'Feasts and saints of the day'. Herewith some notices of saints of 14. July, a day I had skip because of the pressure of other obligations.
14. July is the feast day of:
1) Vincent Madelgar (d. later 7th cent.). This monastic founder (also Vincent of Soignies) is one of a family of 'saints of Maubeuge' (in Hainaut), of whom the two best known are the sisters Aldegund (30. January) and Waldetrude (9. April). His own Vitae et Miracula (BHL 8672 and 8673; 8674 and 8675) are relatively late, being of the first quarter of the eleventh and the first half of the twelfth century respectively. But from mentions in the eighth-century _Vita prima_ of Algegund and the ninth-century _Vita prima_ of Waldetrude, it appears that Vincent was originally named Madelgarius, that he was noble and well endowed with lands, and that he and Waldetrude had a chaste marriage in which however they did not fail in their duty to engender children (in the developed tradition there are four of these, all considered saints). That obligation satisfied, they parted, with Waldetrude withdrawing from the world and subsequently entering a monastery that she had founded in what later became the city of Mons and with Madelgar entering a monastery he had founded at today's Hautmont (Nord) on the Sambre in French Hainaut and there taking the name Vincent. Vincent's _Vita prima_ adds that he founded a second monastery on property he owned at today's Soignies in Belgian Hainaut and that he died there. Since the early Middle Ages he has been celebrated in all these places as well as more widely in the dioceses of Tournai and Cambrai. Relics believed to be Vincent's are kept in Soignies' originally eleventh-century collégiale Saint-Vincent; carbon-14 analysis has established that they could be those of someone who lived in the seventh century.
A French-language account of the collégiale Saint-Vincent at Soignies starts here (use the menu at left for further pages):
http://tinyurl.com/84do4ft
Views of the church (exterior):
http://www.soignies.be/logos_asso/16collegiale_2_cloch.jpg
http://tinyurl.com/7clg9r5
http://tinyurl.com/7b7s4ua
http://tinyurl.com/7sjw2gp
http://tinyurl.com/7rwxu9o
http://tinyurl.com/776d28m
At the beginning of the seventeenth century:
http://tinyurl.com/79yx4ln
Views of the church (interior):
http://tinyurl.com/cwtyfpf
http://tinyurl.com/cu9k4h5
http://www.belgiumview.com/foto/smvote/0000006ah.jpg
Baptismal font:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Collegiale_soignies116.jpg
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Collegiale_soignies117.jpg
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Collegiale_soignies118.jpg
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Collegiale_soignies119.jpg
2) Marchelmus (d. later 8th cent.). The Englishman Marchelmus' missionary activity in Holland is attested to in the Vita of St. Gregory of Utrecht (BHL 3680), in the Vita prima of St. Ludger (BHL 4937), and in the Vita antiqua of St. Lebuin (BHL 4812). A disciple of St. Willbrord, he was assigned by bishop Gregory to work with Lebuin and was associated with him in the building of a church at today's Wilp (Gelderland). From there he evangelized parts of Overijssel; he was in Oldenzaal when he died at a very advanced age. By the end of the Middle Ages relics believed to be those of Marchelmus were in Deventer with those of Lebuin. His appearance under the name Marcellinus in the fabricated Vita of St. Swithbert falsely ascribed to him in 1472 by the latter's actual author Dirck Franckenszoon Pauw led to his being so recorded in martyrologies of the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Cardinal Baronio followed suit in the early RM. Though the error was pointed out by Bolland in 1668 in _AA.SS._, Mart. I., and by Stiltingh in 1723 in _AA.SS._, Jul. III., successive revisers of the RM retained the misnomer until 2001, when Marchelmus was entered for the first time under the name by which he appears in the genuinely early narrative sources.
3) Ulrich of Zell (d. 1093?). The nobly born monastic administrator Ulrich of Zell, a native of Regensburg (whence he is also called Ulrich of Regensburg), is thought to have been educated at that city's monastery of St. Emmeram. He spent some time at the court of his godfather Henry the Black, duke of Bavaria before joining the staff of his uncle Nitker, bishop of Freising. The latter ordained him deacon and later promoted him to archdeacon and provost of his cathedral chapter. Ulrich's earlier twelfth-century Vita by a monk of Zell (BHL 8370; an earlier, closely posthumous Vita [BHL 8369] survives only in fragments) presents him as having distinguished himself at Freising by his concern both for liturgy and for the care of souls and by generosity to the needy that expressed itself most memorably when during a famine he spent the majority of his personal wealth on others' sustenance.
When bishop Nitker died in 1052 Ulrich -- who is said to have been on pilgrimage in the Holy Land -- lost his senior position at the cathedral. Embracing the monastic life at Cluny (this will have been fairly early in the rule of that abbey's St. Hugh), he was ordained priest, served as a confessor and spiritual director, and dealt with francophone brothers who resented the preference accorded to a German. Over the next several decades Ulrich was sent as prior to oversee new foundations in France and Switzerland; at Cluny he wrote for his friend Bl. William of Hirsau the influential _Consuetudines Cluniacenses_. It will surprise few to learn that Ulrich is also known as Ulrich of Cluny.
In the 1080s Ulrich was sent to govern an already existing Cluniac community at Grüningen in the Breisgau; finding the location insufficiently isolated, he re-established the priory in about 1087 at Cella (in modern German, Zell) in the southern Black Forest on a site provided by the bishop of Basel; today the place is St Ulrich, a locality of Bollschweil (Lkr. Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald) in Baden-Württemberg. Ulrich spent the remainder of his life there, guiding his community and adding to it a nearby monastery for women. For his last few years Ulrich was blind. The authors of his Vitae clearly considered him a saint but a feast in his honor (on this day) is not documented before 1139; he is celebrated now by Benedictines and in several German and Swiss dioceses. Seemingly never canonized papally, Ulrich has yet to grace the pages of the RM.
Ulrich of Zell's grave in St. Ulrich's later eighteenth-century Pfarrkirche St. Ulrich is surmounted by this rococo altar by Matthias Faller:
http://tinyurl.com/6pyr24w
4) Hroznata (Bl.; d. 1217). We know about this Bohemian monastic founder and administrator chiefly from his roughly mid-thirteenth-century Vita (BHL 3991) by the abbot of his principal foundation, the Premonstratensian abbey of Teplá. According to this account Hroznata was a member of one of Bohemia's leading families who after the premature death of his young wife and their only son founded the aforementioned abbey on property of his in his native Teplá. Later he took part in the Third Crusade. In about 1200 he founded a convent for Premonstratensian women at Chotěšov, installing as its first abbess his widowed sister Vyslava, and in 1201 he took the Premonstratensian habit at Rome and then entered the abbey of Teplá as a lay brother. Made administrator of the abbey's property, he became embroiled in conflicts with local lords inimical to the abbey and its claims. During a trip away from the abbey in order to defend its interests Hroznata was captured and taken to the castle of Kinšperk where he was imprisoned and held for ransom. While the abbey was attempting to raise the large sum demanded of it Hroznata perished of mistreatment on 14. July 1217. The abbey did manage to ransom his body, which then was solemnly interred before the main altar of the abbey church. Thus far Hroznata's Vita, which concludes with a set of miracles attributed to him. His cult, which appears to have been immediate or nearly so, was maintained both at Teplá and at Chotěšov. It was confirmed papally in 1897 at the level of Beatus. The Premonstratensians are pursuing a canonization cause on Hroznata's behalf.
5) Tuscana (d. before 1343?). Our scanty information about this saint comes from a later fifteenth-century Vita (BHL 8348, 8349) variously attributed either to the Veronese canon regular Celso Maffei or to the Veronese Benedictine Celso delle Falci. According to Celso (whichever Celso this is), Tuscana was a native of today's Zevio (VR) in the Veneto, where she was married to a local member of a prominent family of Verona and lived with him chastely. They spent a third of their wealth in supporting churches, a third in aiding the needy, and a third on the maintenance of their household. After a while they moved to Verona, where they continued to devote themselves to the poor and she assisted daily at a hospice operated by the Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem. When she was widowed Tuscana sold off her possessions and, after having been attacked in her home with sexual intent by three youths (Celso says that these all died on the spot but were brought back to life when after supplication by their families Tuscana prayed for their recovery), became an Hospitaller herself. After a life of further charity and at least one other miracle she died, intending that she should be buried by a public roadway. Tuscana's wish was honored but frequent signs indicated that a holy person was buried at the site. On 30. June of an unspecified year the bishop of Verona had her translated with great pomp to the church of the Hospitallers. Thus far Celso. Later writers date the translation to 1343. By the end of the Middle Ages Tuscana's feast was celebrated in Verona on 14. July.
Best,
John Dillon
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